Copyright: your number's up
   By FERGUS SHIEL / The Age (Melbourne)
   Thursday 4 October 2001

   Listen up, they've got your number.  Australian composers Nigel
   Helyer, aka Dr Sonique, and Jon Drummond have copyrighted
   100,000,000,000 telephone tone sequences.

   You might not know it but every time you dial a number, you play a
   short melody.

   With the aid of a computer, Helyer and Drummond have notated the
   tones of every imaginable phone number combination and, in turn,
   claimed the melodies as their own.  Next time you make a phone call,
   therefore, chances are you'll be in breach of international copyright
   law.

   If business can claim ownership over the elemental building blocks
   of human life, the composers say it's only fitting that artists lay
   claim to the "DNA" of business and are paid for it.

   "We're saying to (big business), 'Okay guys, the boot is on the other
   foot.  If you really believe in copyright, you've got to pay'," Helyer
   says.

   "I think Mr Howard will be high on the list.  Universities.  Lots of
   corporations.  We'll go for it."

   The composers say their "Magnus-Opus" is a playful way of lampooning
   copyright laws that protect big business rather than artists.

   You can check your home, work, mobile, fax or modem number against
   their compositional database by logging on to www.magnus-opus.com.

   If your number is matched, the melody will be played, the notes scored
   and a direction given to complete the licence agreement supplied
   online as soon as possible.

   Helyer and Drummond, who've only just launched the website, say
   they've had one offer of payment already.  "An American guy tired of
   direct sales people calling him has told us he'd like to purchase
   the copyright for his number so that he can stop them," Helyer says.

   The website explains in greater detail how the composers went about their
   creation by throwing 16 tone pairs into an algorithmic generation to
   produce countless melodies.

   "The whole telecommunications system is entirely musicalised," Helyer says.

   ("Magnus-Opus" will be installed at the Adelaide Festival of the Arts next
   year.)

Janos Gereben/SF
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